Health workers to down tools

MASERU – DOCTORS and nurses say they will embark on a nationwide strike starting Monday to press the government to urgently address their grievances.
The strike action will likely hurt the country’s battle against Covid-19 which has so killed one person while infecting 134 people.

Dr Mojakisane Ramafikeng, who is the spokesman of the Coalition of Health Professionals (CHP), said the strike will continue until the government bows to their demands.
The health professionals are demanding M7 000 each on top of their monthly salaries as a risk allowance if the government does not provide them with tax holidays for six consecutive months.

Dr Ramafikeng told thepost yesterday that the government was taking its grievances lightly.
He said they had tabled their grievances on how the government needed to deal with the Covid-19 pandemic a long time ago but nothing was done to address their concerns.

Dr Ramafikeng said the fight against Covid-19 will not be won if those in the frontline – the key health professionals – are not well equipped to deal with the pandemic.
He said their main grievance is the government’s failure to provide health workers with personal protective clothing thus putting them at risk of infection.

“As a health worker I examine more than 20 people per day meaning the (risk) can be high,” Dr Ramafikeng said.
He said last week they went to the National Covid-19 Secretariat (Nacosec) where they tabled their grievance to the new leadership.
He said some health workers have not been paid since March until today therefore they are wondering how they are expected to work for three months without pay.

He said the other issue was that the government did not want to pay a risk allowance they felt would adequately cover them as they fight the disease.

Dr Ramafikeng said they had also asked for tax holidays for health workers for six months. The request was also turned down.
He also said they have analyzed the expenses of health workers during the time of Covid-19 hence they decided that the risk allowance should be paid urgently as well as the provision of tax holiday.

He said the risk allowance should be given to every person irrespective of whether they work for the government or are in the private sector.
He said they told the meeting that if they are not given a tax holiday they should be given M7 000 each.
“They refused saying it will not happen,” he said.

Dr Ramafikeng said they are not paid for being in the frontline and at risk of contracting the killer virus.
“If we get infected we will infect other people whom we are supposed to treat and take care of,” he said.
He also said the government must increase ICU wards and beds.
The country has only 12 ICU beds across all districts.

The Nacosec spokesman Tumisang Mokoai, who is also the Health Ministry’s chief spokesman, said they took the initiative to engage at a meeting last Sunday.
“They gave us a hard time asking who we were but the meeting took off anyway,” Mokoai said.

He said they had received information that there is a disagreement between the CHP and the Minister of Health Motlatsi Maqelepo.
Mokoai said they invited the minister and the Principal Secretary Thebe Mokoatle to the meeting where the health workers tabled their grievances.

The government, he said, maintained that paying M7 000 allowances was not possible under the current economic environment when the country was grappling with the Covid-19 pandemic.
“They also wanted tax holiday, meaning their salaries would not be taxed,” he said.

Mokoai said they also wanted Nacosec to cover the risks of private sector health workers but “the government did not approve it too”.
Mokoai said the government had offered a risk allowance of M3 500 per month.
“(That offer) is final,” he said.

Nkheli Liphoto